ring,--some one who said that such a hand was worthy of a diamond, that
turquoises were a pretty color, but that there was only one stone for an
engagement ring, and that was a diamond. At the Christmas dance the same some
one had said that her waltzing would make her "all the rage" in Boston. She
wondered if it were true, and wondered whether, if she had not promised to
marry Stephen, some splendid being from a city would have descended from his
heights, bearing diamonds in his hand. Not that she would have accepted them;
she only wondered. These disloyal thoughts came seldom, and she put them
resolutely away, devoting herself with all the greater assiduity to her muslin
curtains and ruffled pillow-shams. Stephen, too, had his momentary pangs.
There were times when he could calm his doubts only by working on the little
house. The mere sight of the beloved floors and walls and ceilings comforted
his heart, and brought him good cheer.

The winter was a cold one, so bitterly cold that even the rapid water at the
Gray Rock was a mass of curdled yellow ice, something that had only occurred
once or twice before within the memory of the oldest inhabitant.

It was also a very gay season for Pleasant River and Edgewood. Never had there
been so many card-parties, sleigh-rides, and tavern dances, and never such
wonderful skating. The river was one gleaming, glittering thoroughfare of ice
from Milliken's Mills to the dam at the Edgewood bridge. At sundown bonfires
were built here and there on the mirror-like surface, and all the young people
from the neighboring villages gathered on the ice; while detachments of merry,
rosy-cheeked boys and girls, those who preferred coasting, met at the top of
Brigadier Hill, from which one could get a longer and more perilous slide than
from any other point in the township.

Claude Merrill, in his occasional visits from Boston, was very much in
evidence at the Saturday evening ice parties. He was not an artist at the